Summer flowers of the high Alps / [Somerville Hastings].

  • Somerville Hastings
Date:
1910
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Summer flowers of the high Alps / [Somerville Hastings]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    178/202 page 74
    The Marsh Orchis (ORCHIS LATIFOLIA) A large number of Orchids are to be found in the Alps. They form a well-defined group of plants which are particu- larly interesting in view of complicated devices which they have adopted to ensure the fertilisation of their seeds by the agency of insect visitors. Nearly all the English species are found in Switzerland, and most of them are met with in much greater abundance there. The beautiful pink Helle- borine, the sweet-scented Butterfly Orchis, may be found in profusion on the lower mountain slopes, and the dark red Nigritella, with its odour of vanilla, and the ghost-like Coral-root, in the higher regions. Of the genus Orchis alone there are no less than seven- teen Swiss species. Many of these are much alike, and by no means easy to distinguish from one another. One of the most abundant is the Marsh Orchis, which is also met with in England, but is not nearly so common there. The plant grows in damp meadows and boggy places, where an average sized plant may be 18 inches or two feet high. Its large purple spotted flowers appear in June and may last until July. The methods adopted by the plant to ensure the fertilisa- tion of its flowers by means of insect visitors are most elaborate and exact, but without the aid of diagrams they are a little difficult to explain. It is curious that no honey
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